Anaheim : Residents Refuse to Meet With Vendors

In what may be a death knell for the city’s street vendors, there will be no compromise between them and residents who want them banned from their neighborhoods.

A City Council majority has said it would vote for the ban Tuesday unless a compromise is reached between the two sides.

But in a letter to the council, Neighbors Opposed to Street Vendors in Anaheim, or NOVA, stated that its leaders would not meet with the vendors.

“At this point, we do not feel mediation or negotiation is warranted,” stated the letter, which council members received Thursday. “NOVA must decline to meet with the street vendors’ representatives because of numerous incidents of threats and intimidation.”

There are 153 licensed vendors in the city and several who are unlicensed. Working primarily in the downtown and Disneyland areas, they sell a variety of products including produce, groceries, cigarettes and clothes.

Janet Downs, NOVA’s former president, would not comment Friday on the letter or on the possibility of negotiations. She resigned from her post this week, but no replacement has been named.

Another NOVA member confirmed that the group has no intention of meeting with the vendors.

The group accuses the vendors of habitually violating city ordinances that require them to move at least 200 feet every hour and prohibit them from littering and creating excessive noise.

They also charge that some vendors sell cigarettes smuggled from Mexico, that they sell the contraband to minors and that they urinate on lawns.

But Salvador Sarmiento, the vendors’ attorney, said he hopes the council will now side with the vendors, since NOVA is refusing to negotiate.

The Anaheim Street Vendors Assn., which represents 60 of the city’s vendors, has said it would agree to increased fines for violators.

It says members obey the city regulations and should not be forced out of business because of the actions of others.

“The vendors are willing to bend; it is NOVA that is not willing to bend,” Sarmiento said. “Maybe (the council) will realize that what NOVA is saying they cannot back up and that they are just making emotional arguments.”

He said that if the council does vote to ban the vendors, a lawsuit to block the ordinance would be considered.

“A lot of these vendors have seven or eight trucks, and in a week they could be wiped out,” Sarmiento said. “We are talking about substantial property rights that would be taken away without just compensation.”

The vendors, who are almost exclusively Latino, have accused some of their opponents of making racist comments.

In its letter to the council, NOVA stated that it did not condone any racist comments that may have been made and that its opposition to vendors is based on their actions, not their ethnicity.

“NOVA’s position has always been that this is a zoning issue only,” the letter says. “Anaheim’s residents have a fundamental right to peaceful enjoyment of our residential neighborhoods--free from commercial enterprise.”

The council meeting begins at 5 p.m. at City Hall, 200 S. Anaheim Blvd.